[Linganth] Plugging sessions

[Candy Goodwin (by way of Richard J Senghas)]

[I think this was intended for the list.]

Hi Richard,
Not sure if you want the elaborated abstract for session or not, but
here it is. The session in Sunday morning at 8 AM.

Embodied Language, Participation, and Learning in the Inhabited
Lifeworld  organized by Marjorie Goodwin and Lourdes de Leon

This session investigates how embodied language practices and
participation are used to structure learning and exploration of the
world in different social groups. We examine learning within situated
activities encompassing a range of participation frameworks: (1)
situations entailing clear expert/novice relationships (such as in
professional work settings), (2) settings in which expert/novice
relationships may be seen to be more symmetrical, to shift and be
more fluid, and (3) circumstances where novices guide their own
learning experiences through observation and experimentation without
the assistance or awareness of others. Across all of these contexts
multiple modalities, including language, intonation, gesture, and the
body, are critical to the process of meaning making. In contrast to
professional contexts, learning in less structured settings such as
informal tutoring, play, or chores affords more symmetrical or even
individual participant frameworks.
C. Goodwin examines the multi-modal context of apprenticeship in
professional settings including archaeology or surgery, where ways of
seeing, knowing, and acting are integrated with mastery of the use of
tools. Specifically, talk is tied closely to environmentally coupled
gestures that link categories to the phenomena in the work
environment being categorized. Klein examines a Spanish language
lesson between a Central American mechanic and the Indian son of his
boss in a Los Angeles gas station. In the garage setting more mutable
relationships between participants are observable as participants
shift their use of language (employing a linguistic repertoire of
English, Spanish, and Hindi) and index multiple, often
situation-specific, identities. M Goodwin examines how in the midst
of a middle class  (Afro-Cuban/Australian) family's everyday
activity, i.e., doing chores or walking in the neighborhood,
opportunities for occasioned learning, or exploring new ideas about
how the world works as well as learning new vocabulary can
spontaneously arise. Language play in the midst of such activities
affords sustained engagement and equal participation among family
members, creating an ethos of heightened affect. In peer play,
interaction during hop scotch, Garcia-Sanchez examines the
interactional, linguistic and socializing practices of immigrant
non-native speaking children, who become mentors facilitating
cultural learning and competent language use.
Rogoff offers a model of "intent participation." She specifies the
dimensions that characterize participation among the Highland
Guatemalan Maya where children are integrated in the range of
community activities. Intent participation is horizontal and
collaborative, with fluid responsibilities. Her model contrasts with
a number of other forms of organizing learning, especially the
assembly-line instruction that often characterizes schooling and some
aspects of middle-class parent-child communication.
Finally, analyzing activities of exploration and experimentation of
Tzotzil Mayan speaking children of Zinacantan de Leon examines
situations where expertise is unexpected and, in some cases,
considered socially sanctioned. She finds children showing unexpected
skills in the use of tools, as well as participation in ritual
activities where mis-performance can be socially unacceptable. All of
these papers reveal the way in which embodied language and
participation are central to the acquisition and organization of the
cultural knowledge that defines particular social groups.
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Candy Goodwin
    Anthropology
    UCLA
    Los Angeles CA 90095-1553
         mgoodwin at anthro.ucla.edu
http://www.sscnet.ucla.edu/anthro/faculty/goodwin
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